Photography documents the lifestyle of Chicago motorcycle club

by April Helms special products editor Published: February 17, 2013 12:00 AM

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Area residents wanting a glimpse of what it was like being with a motorcycle club in the 1960s can see "Danny Lyon: The Bikeriders" through June 21 in the Akron Art Museum's Fred and Laura Ruth Bidwell Gallery.

Lyon is "a self-trained photographer" who started taking photographs while in school, said Arnold Tunstall, collections manager.

"Danny Lyon: The Bikeriders" features 35 of the museum's collection of 50 photographs of members of the Chicago Outlaw Motorcycle Club taken more than 45 years ago.

Born in 1942, Lyon grew up in Queens, N.Y. and in 1963 earned his BA from the University of Chicago. A self-taught photographer and filmmaker, Lyon demonstrated an interest in photographing his peers rather than strangers early in his career. He became a leading figure in the emerging style called New Journalism, in which the artist immerses himself with his subjects as an active participant, not an objective observer. For "The Bikeriders" he became a member of the Chicago Outlaw Motorcycle Club and developed a friendship and concern for his fellow members.

"He wanted to make a new kind of journalism," Tunstall said.

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The series shows the members of the Chicago Outlaws not only riding their bikes across the country, but in a variety of settings. Members can be seen alongside motorcycle racers during rallies, relaxing between rides and in their everyday lives.

"He was trying to combat the media view of youth and motorcyclists," Tunstall said. "These were just guys who liked to ride bikes and liked to race. They are normal, everyday people who happened to like motorcycles."

Lyon's series of photographs from his years with the Chicago Outlaws resulted in a groundbreaking book published in 1968, Tunstall said. At the time of its initial publication, photo-journalistic books that tell a story through images and text from the subject did not really exist.

"The book includes the photos and transcripts from his interviews from the members," Tunstall said. "He did not try to filter them, but he published the interviews as is."

Finding a copy of the book is very difficult because it is currently out of print, and existing copies have been known to sell for hundreds of dollars, Tunstall said.

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Lyon has gone on to become an influential and transformative figure in the field of documentary photography, Tunstall said. He has received the Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship twice, first in 1969 for photography and again in 1979 for film making. He continues to immerse himself and his camera in the various subcultures that he documents. One project included interviews of Texas prisoners, "Conversations with the Dead." In 2011 he released a book titled Deep Sea Diver and has documented the recent Occupy movement and demonstrations.

"His whole career has been championing people he thought were given a bad rap, who have been marginalized or silenced in a way," Tunstall said.